(TibetanReview.net, Jun23, 2017) – After being taken away by Chinese police on Aug 24 last year and remaining disappeared ever since, two Tibetan monks in Dzoege (Chinese: Ruo’ergai) County of Ngaba (Aba) Prefecture, Sichuan Province, have suddenly been brought to a court and jailed for up to five years for having allegedly engaged in “separatist activities”, reported the Tibetan Service of Radio Free Asia (Washington) Jun 21. The monks – Gendun Drakpa, 40, and Lobsang Sherab, 36 – were tried and sentenced around Jun 17, the report said, citing an exiled Tibetan with local contacts speaking on condition of anonymity.

Drakpa was jailed for five years and Sherab for four years. The two were “found” guilty of having passed politically sensitive information to outside contacts. It was not stated what information the monks had passed out, or by what means, and who the recipients were.

The source was cited as saying the monks were not allowed to seek any assistance from a lawyer; nor were they allowed to speak in their defence. They were also not allowed any meeting with their parents and other relatives. Police were reported to have confiscated the mobile phones of Tibetans who attended the trial as witnesses.

The monks had been taken away from their monastery of Thangkor Soktsang, located in Ngaba. Drakpa was the monastery’s treasurer and Sherab a worker in its store. They were taken away in a huff with pointing of guns and with Sherab being not allowed even to put on his clothes. A monk who tried to stop the police was reported to have been set upon by five of them and got injured.